CHAPTER 13
B
arron knew better than to roll up in Harlem looking like an oil mogul and smelling like cash, so instead of hiring a limo and a driver the way he usually did when he traveled out of town, he rented a nice little Acura at the airport and drove into Manhattan on his own.
New York was full of flossers, and even though he dug the city, especially Broadway and the financial districts, Barron wasn't feeling the kind of women that places like Brooklyn, Harlem, and the Bronx spit out.
He had driven across the bridge and toward the projects of Harlem, and everywhere he looked there were chicks like Mink who were living strictly for the city.
They walked around all glossed and glammed up in the city heat, with more ass and titties popping out of their skimpy clothes than a little bit. Their quick, hungry eyes checked him out as he drove by, and he eyed them right back. Yeah, some of them were fine and packing big bombs, but a whole lot of them were also rough and grimy. Tough chickens that the streets had dried out and used up. With their crazy four-color curved nails and matching wigs, tatted-up tits, swap-meet Gucci purses, and over-the-top gear, they were colorful products of the gutters they were trying so damn hard to claw their way out of.
Barron had hit up the PI dude named Frankie Gaines as soon as he touched down at the airport. Frankie was an ex-parole officer who came from a big family in Harlem. Although most of the men in his family were in law enforcement, Frankie had ditched his monkey suit so he could be his own boss. They were planning to meet at T. C.'s Place, a renovated pool hall that one of Frankie's boyz ran, and Barron wanted to make sure he was there right on time.
“Yo, ya girl Mink LaRue been bizzy as hell. Bizzy, bizzy, bizzy!” Frankie said as he dapped Barron out and greeted him at the front door of the old pool hall that was now a youth nightclub. He had a folder in his hand, and Barron followed the young, street-tested dude to a small office down a hall. “So how much did this fine-ass thief hit you for?”
“A hundred grand.”
Frankie's eyes got big as he shook his head. “
Damn
, fool! Where you from, my brotha? That trick
stole
you! You shoulda called a nigga up a long time ago and I coulda saved you some cash!”
“Lemme see what you got,” Barron said. His hands shook with greedy excitement as he reached for the report Frankie was holding.
Frankie waved him off and started reading. “Pick pocketing, drug distribution, credit-card fraud, shakedowns, blackmail schemes, wire fraud, identity theft, grand larceny, breaking and entering, prescription scams, bad-check writing . . .” He held up a glossy head shot photo of Mink and then tossed it on the table. “And I'm not talking about just here in Harlem neither. This chick done hit everywhere,” Frankie said, shaking his head. “Jersey, Connecticut, Philly, Baltimore, DC . . . believe it. If Mink LaRue ran across something that wasn't nailed downâher ass stole it.”
Frankie let out a bitter chuckle and passed Barron the report. “The only thing I didn't find on her is dead bodies. I ain't saying she don't have none, it's just that ain't none of them started stinking yet.”
“God
damn
,” Barron muttered under his breath, and then whistled out loud as his eyes continued to scan the report. “This is worse than I thought.”
“Word, bruh. The more shit I dug up on her the more shit came pouring in. This little chicken's been criminal minded ever since she hatched out the egg! For real, and her moms is the one who got her started pulling scams in the first place.”
“Her mother?”
Frankie nodded. He searched through the stack of paper in the folder and pulled out two sheets.
“I got a report right here that says she was just a toddler when her and her mother were on a city-owned bus and it crashed into a parked car. Her moms faked a bunch of injuries for both of them and she used Mink to get a big fat settlement from the city's insurance company. I guess pulling ganks got good to them because they've been pulling them ever since.”
Barron thought about his own mother who was back at the mansion with the felonious Mink right now. Dane was there with her too, but he couldn't be counted on to protect Selah because if it wasn't about getting high then that pussy nigga wasn't shit. Barron shook his head. “Yo, I'ma have to get back home and toss that lil bandit up outta my crib, man.”
Frankie laughed. “Nigga you better hope you still
got
a crib when you get back. The way this chick's been running through other people's paper you might go back and find all your shit transferred into her name!”
Barron took that shit in stride. He knew this hood dick was sitting there laughing at him, but it was cool because Mink really did have him looking just like a clown.
“I found one more thing for you,” Frankie said as his laughter faded away and he got real serious.
Barron frowned. “Yeah, what's that?”
“I found Mink's nigga. Her ex-convict boyfriend. A cutthroat street slanga they call Gutta who just hit the bricks. He rolls with a killer click, and word on the streets is that Mink dipped out with a whole grip of young dude's paper. And now that nigga wants it back. Every goddamn dime of it.”
Barron's ears perked right up. Now this was the type of shit he liked to hear!
“So, Mink beat a drug dealer out of some money? And now he's on her ass?”
“Yep. That's the story. I dug up a heap of dirt on dude too. He ain't no petty thief like ya girl Mink is, but he
is
a killer.”
Barron wanted to jump up and down.
“Yo, I wanna meet this dude. Put me on to him.”
Frankie nodded. “A'ight. I might can do that. That nigga's on probation, so lemme holla at a few of my brothers and see if we can work something out.”
Barron grinned and rubbed his hands together. He loved a good fight, and he was willing to trick off mad money to watch this cat Gutta fly Mink's head upside a wall. Hell yeah. If he could sic a dog like Gutta on Mink and get those two to go at it hard, then he'd gladly sit back and watch the show and buy everybody in the room some damn popcorn.
Â
Frankie Gaines was good to his word. He had mad family who worked in New York law enforcement, and his little brother Dutchy was actually Gutta's probation officer.
“Yo, you sure we're gonna be good running up on him in here?” Barron asked as they walked into the probation building and slid past damn near a hundred convicted criminals. They were scattered everywhere in the large room. Some were lounging on the chairs, and others were leaning up against the walls, and a few were even laid out on the grimy floor.
“Yeah, we straight,” Frankie said over his shoulder. “He's in there with my brother Dutchy right now. You know they gotta make sure his shit is straight and he ain't violating nothing.”
They walked down a long hallway that had small offices lining both sides. Hard-looking ex-cons were flowing in and out of doorways looking pissed off at the world. Frankie led Barron into an office on the right side of the hall. A brown-skinned brother sat behind a desk, and another dude, muscle-bound and huge as shit, sat in a folding chair with his back to the door.
He was a hard nigga, Barron could tell that even before dude turned around and grilled him. Young, but dangerous. He was dressed like the streets and a cold look of disdain lurked in his eyes. He shifted his massive shoulders slightly to the right so he could see Barron better, and everything about his chiseled posture and the vibe he was giving off labeled him a predator.
Barron waited while Frankie went over to the desk and dapped his brother out, and then he introduced Barron to Dutchy, and Dutchy introduced them both to Gutta.
“Sup,” Barron said and reached out to Gutta for some dap.
That nigga never even blinked. The look in his cold eyes said Barron was just a sweet lil bitch who didn't deserve no love.
“Check it out,” Frankie explained to Gutta as he closed the office door and got ready to play power broker and fit all the puzzle pieces together. “This here is my boy, Bump. He's from Texas. He's cool with ya girl, Mink. Matter fact, she's his sister.”
Leaning against the wall, Barron felt the chill go up in Gutta's eye when Mink's name was mentioned. Dude had a jaw that looked like it could stand up to a sledgehammer and he clenched it hard when he heard her name, like he was ready to chew something up.
Frankie spent the next few minutes running Mink's latest game down to Gutta, who got more and more swole by the minute. Barron got his two cents in too, and dropped big dimes on Mink and blew her shit up without an ounce of brotherly love. He told Gutta about the hundred grand that Mink had scammed his family for, and about the rest of the cash she was down in Texas trying to get her hands on right as they were speaking.
“Yo!” Gutta growled, opening his mouth for the first time. “You tellin' me that bitch tricked off all my fuckin' money and then she stole a hunnerd grand off you and dipped with that shit too? Wit'out paying me minez?”
Barron shook his head. “Nah, man. I'm telling you she spent the hundred grand she got from me too. And
then
she dipped. Her ass is broke again right now, but unless I can come up with something concrete on her, she's probably gonna clean us out again. And this time she's gonna get even more than she got the first time.”
Gutta shrugged. He was a solo gorilla. Barron could see it all in his face. He was gonna take Mink down in his own vicious way, and he didn't need no pack of wolves to help him hunt neither. “So what y'all pussy niggas need me for?”
“I need you as my proof of what she's been out here doing, man,” Barron said. “Proof in the flesh. Come with me back to Texas, man, and I'll make sure you get back five times what Mink owes you. Plus a whole lot more.”
CHAPTER 14
T
wo nights later Barron was ready to get back to Texas and be about the bizz of blowing Mink's shit up. Gutta had agreed to roll with him to Dallas, and Frankie Gaines drove him to the projects to scoop dude up so they could head to LaGuardia Airport and catch a red-eye flight going south.
“You think he's really gonna fly?” Barron asked as they got outta Frankie's whip and strode up the walkway to the fourteen-story project building in St. Nick projects.
Frankie shrugged. “I guess so. Shit, the nigga said he would.”
A group of rowdy young slangas stood loitering outside the entrance to the building wearing huge white tees and loose jeans sagging low on their asses. Barron wasn't no bitch by any stretch of the imagination, but he wasn't no banga neither. He rode the fence between the worlds of the haves and the have nots, but he damn sure liked chillin' on the money side better.
He had left his expensive business suits and thirty-thousand-dollar shoes back in Texas where they belonged. He had left his 9mm behind too, and even though he was dressed in decent shit, it was still the gear of the streets. His ensemble might have been understated, but it was still fresh as hell. It didn't come off a rack on 125th Street, but it hadn't come outta Brooks Brothers neither.
He followed Frankie toward the trap boys with a tight feeling burrowing in his stomach that he recognized as unease. Whether it was Houston or Harlem, the hood was still the hood, and dudes from the projects could smell a nigga who wasn't from around their way. Even though he wasn't strapped, Barron manned up and made sure he wasn't giving off even the slightest whiff of fear or concern, and when Frankie dapped out the young'uns and they showed him love by parting to let him through, Barron walked easily through the crowd right behind him.
They took the elevator up to the twelfth floor and got off and walked around the corner to the last apartment on the left. Frankie knocked on the door, then stood back a little bit so whoever looked out the peephole could see who he was before they opened the door.
“Who is it?”
“It's Frankie. I'm looking for Gutta.”
Locks turned and the door swung open. The two men stepped inside the small apartment. The old lady who had let them in smelled like Newports and fried eggs. She motioned for them to wait in the living room. Barron looked around the small area. There were statues of Jesus on the cross all over the walls, and it smelled like a pot of beans and fatback was cooking on the stove in the kitchen.
Barron wondered again about Gutta. He had his doubts about that nigga. As hardbody as he was, the thought of getting on an airplane scared the shit outta him.
“Yo, I fucks with whips, trains, and buses, nah'm sayin?” Gutta had told him. “I don't fuck with no airplanes and all that kinda aerodynamic bullshit right there.”
Gutta had tried to play him by telling him he needed half the money up front, but Barron wasn't no sucka and he had let that big nigga know it. His offer was non-negotiable. Wasn't no transactions going down until they got to Texas, and if Gutta wanted to get paid and get his hands around Mink's throat, then his ass had to get on an airplane and roll with it.
Gutta came outta the back of the apartment looking mean and tight. The odor of hard liquor surrounded him in a cloud. He glanced at the men standing in the living room, then brushed right past the old lady and walked straight out the door.
“What the fuck?” Barron muttered as the door slammed shut. He scrambled behind Frankie, who snatched the door open and followed Gutta out into the narrow hallway.
“Yo,” Barron hollered as Gutta pushed through the stairway door and bounded down the pissy, garbage-strewn stairs. “You still going, right? Where's your bags and shit, man?”
Gutta led them all the way down to the first floor, through the crowded project lobby, and outside into the warm night air. Barron didn't know if this nigga was gonna get in the whip and ride out to the airport or not, but to his surprise Gutta paused and followed Frankie down the walkway and got in on the passenger side of the car.
Barron squeezed into the backseat with his long legs crunched up, and they rode a short distance away to Frankie's crib, where Barron had left his rented Acura. He had already dished off the dollars he owed the private investigator, so him and Gutta switched cars and left Frankie standing on the curb outside of his building.
As soon as they pulled off Gutta turned the radio to a rap station and cranked the volume up loud. They rode down the streets of Harlem with their windows vibrating from the bass, and Gutta tryna stomp a hole in the floorboard as he kept up with the song's beat. Barron had just turned onto Lenox Avenue when Gutta threw him a stiff bow and told him to stop the car.
“Yo! Pull this shit over!” he barked over the music. They were just about to pass Club Lick 'Em, an elite titty bar and strip joint where the streets were packed and a big crowd of people were coming and going. “I need to make a quick stop in that joint. My manz supposed to be up in there tonight.”
Barron cut his wheels to the right and got out of traffic, then shook his head in mad exasperation. He knew Gutta wasn't trying to get inside no strip club to get up with no nigga. This fool had the fear of flying and a thirst for liquor on the brain.
“C'mon, my dude!” Barron tried to reason with him. “There's some drinks waiting for us at a lounge in the airport. This ain't the time to be hollering at no freaks in the club.”
But Gutta had already opened his door and hopped out.
“Shit!” Barron cursed and turned the radio down as he watched Gutta bounce through the club's front door. It was crowded as hell out there. Every parking spot was taken, and the streets were lined with double-parked whips. All kinds of pimp-type nigs were rolling out of limos with half-naked working girls hanging off their arms. Barron doubled-parked his rental car a block away and started walking briskly toward the club.
Selling pussy wasn't what it used to be, he noticed as a giggling pair of young hookers brushed past him and he caught a whiff of their scent and frowned. A lot of chicks on the stroll these days looked tapped out. Instead of fixing themselves up so they could turn a dude on, some of the shit they slapped on was a straight turn off. If Barron was gonna lay out good money for some used pussy then the chick better smell like honey and perfume, not like a whole jar of sour pickles and some flaming-hot Cheetos.
Outside the club, fliers were taped to the door and plastered on the windows that said Club Lick 'Em was hosting its fourth annual Tri-City Playa's Ball for the Labor Day weekend. Hustlers and chicks from New York, New Jersey, Baltimore, DC, and Philly were ballin' and partying together and drumming up money so a portion could be donated to a children's outreach foundation.
Barron pulled the door open and the thick smell of funky carpets and sweaty ass washed over him. He stepped inside and immediately his eyes were drawn to the stage on the far side of the room. The overhead lights were dim, and colorful spotlights shone down on the strippers as they snaked their bangin' bodies around the shiny golden poles.
Barron walked in deeper, and his eyes scanned the tables as he searched for Gutta. He spotted him sitting with a bunch of hood nigs, right up front where the action was. Picking up an empty chair, Barron joined them at the round table that had been pushed off slightly to the side.
Gutta was chilling with his set and getting even more lit. Him and all his boyz fronted Barron off with killer glares when he sat down, but the hostility disappeared when a long-legged waitress in a short skirt and high heels came over to take Barron's drink order and he told her to bring him some yak and to give Gutta and his friends another round of whatever the fuck they was already drinking.
“Goddamn!” Gutta hollered real loud as a new round of strippers came up on the stage. It looked like a bunch of fine-ass working girls were out in full force tonight. A lot of them had come from out of town with their pimps, and they seemed hot and hyped to participate in all the sexy contests that Club Lick 'Em was hosting for the weekend. With his eyes glued to the chicks on the stage, Gutta tossed back his drink and pointed at the one in the middle and yelled, “That bitch right there got some nice big titties!”
Gutta's crew laughed in agreement as Barron checked the girl out. Her chest
was
puffed out real tight, but it didn't look half as good as Mink's did. All of a sudden he felt something like jealousy jump up in his chest as he cut his eyes at Gutta. This drunk fool had been all up in Mink's guts. He'd sucked those pretty titties with the nice thick nipples, and he'd banged that plump ass of hers and tasted that juicy slit too.
“I gotta piss.” Gutta got up from the table and disappeared into the darkness of the crowd. Barron couldn't help plastering his eyes back on the stage. The combination of thinking about Mink and watching the sexy stripper grind her ass on the stage pole made a knot rise in his drawers. He scooted his chair further under the table and tossed back his Hen dog, then signaled to the waitress to bring him another round.
But before she could come over to the table, the lights changed on the stage and a slamming cut blasted from the speakers. All the little tester-strippers ran toward the background, and a whole new slew of fine big-booty girls, about six of them, busted out from the darkness strutting their thick thighs and round hips on center stage, and started twerkin' and grinding and mopping up the floor as they dipped their sexy chips.
Every man at the table sat there with his mouth wide open, mesmerized and damn-near sucked into a coma by the spectacular thighs on one particular shawty who was rocking a frilly yellow thong. Her legs were thick and shapely and she was shaking her ass like she was trying to make both cheeks fall off.
Just about every chick up in this set could make the average nigga cum in his drawers, but none of them had shit on the explosion of red feathers that suddenly burst out from deep in the back of the crowd. She wore a mask over her face, but her luscious body was high yellow and exotic. Sicker than sick. A small halo of red feathers circled her head and two tiny ones were stuck to each of her nipples. Her hips looked like sweet lemon perfection. Her waist was tighter than tight, and her redbone ass was hunked out in the back like it shoulda had its own zip code. She coiled and winded her body at the waist just like a snake, and every eye in the house was molesting the hell outta her stunning bottom half.
Barron couldn't believe what he was seeing. Mami was twerkin' her thick butt so hard her flesh jiggled and made his eyes go gaga. She shimmied across the stage with her magnificent body drawing whistles, big bank, and resounding applause. Barron's dick swelled up in his pants to twice its normal size, and he was just about to holler out loud when Gutta came back to the table. He stared at the gorgeous stripper for a quick second, and then that drunk gangsta nig wilded straight the fuck out!
“Yo,
Mink
!” he hollered at the top of his lungs.
The chick on the stage ignored him as she spread her stunning legs for all the men to see. She ran her tongue around the edge of her lips and massaged her slick pearl with one slim finger. Greenbacks rained down on her like a tropical shower as dudes tossed their entire pocket stash at her feet. She bit down on her lower lip, then grinded her hips in a sexy circle and humped her hand at the same time, and a puddle of drool leaked from almost every mouth up in the joint.
Gutta lost his head. He snatched up his chair and held it over his head, and then he launched that shit up on the stage like it was a missile. Strippers came up off their poles screaming and ducking. The girl pulled her finger outta her pussy, snatched off her mask, and bent down and started scooping her money up off the floor as fast as she could.
Two bouncers in white tees rushed over to get at Gutta, but he was a big muthafucka. He swung on the tall one with the bald head and crashed dude flush in the grill. Before the other bouncer could get him some, Gutta leaped up on the stage and grabbed the girl around her ankles as she tried to run away, yanking her down to the floor.
“Mink!”
The other strippers screamed in terror as the girl slammed down on the stage ass-first. Red feathers flew everywhere. Fighting like a true soldier, she kicked out viciously at Gutta, digging her pointy high heels all in his face. Screaming at the top of her lungs, she threw a flurry of man-blows at his head that had that drunk nigga covering up instead of fighting back.
“Get the fuck offa me, you psycho bitch!” she hollered as Gutta got her in a bear hug and laid her out flat. He was all over her ass, and he flipped her into a headlock and started choking her lights out right in front of Barron's eyes.
About five bouncers attacked outta nowhere. They rushed up on the stage and swallowed Gutta up as the music came to a screeching halt and the overhead lights were flicked on.
Gutta's crew started wildin' out too. They jumped up on the stage swinging and tossing mad dudes off of their manz.
“
Mink
!” Barron could hear Gutta bellowing drunkenly from somewhere near the bottom of the fighting pile. “Bitch I'ma kill your ass! I'ma kill your ass, Mink!”